Home For Biscuits
by Heather68
Summary: Lily invites Severus home for tea and biscuits. Severus is less than enthused. DH-compliant


**Title:** Home for Biscuits  
**Author:** Faynia  
**Length:** 2,310  
**Pairings:** Gen  
**Rating:** G  
**Summary:** Lily invites Severus home for tea and biscuits. Severus is less than enthused.  
**Notes:** A great big spanking thank you to **rakina** for betaing something that I'm sure most know she normally never would, and to **sesheta66** who helped my finish this when everything I thought of irritated me.

* * *

Lily wasn't sure what made her invite Severus home for biscuits, but she did it anyway. She felt bad about always having to meet him at the playground by the swings. It didn't make any difference that she'd never get invited to his home in return. The heat sweltered and Lily's red hair clung to her neck from sweat, having long since fallen out of the single braid down her back. She lunged for Severus' arm and tugged on it. 

"Come on, my mum's just made biscuits."

"And your point is?" Severus asked, clearly confused. Lily giggled when he cocked his head to the side.

She smiled, and bounced up and down on the balls of her feet. "Well, my mum wants to meet you because I've talked about you a lot to her," Lily admitted, coloring at Severus' open stare. She wasn't lying. The first thing she had told her mum when she got home from Hogwarts for the summer was all the fun things she and Severus had done, which was admittedly not a whole lot, but her mother hadn't stopped her once during her gush about studies and how she and Severus had studied so hard together in the library because they wouldn't have been able to get any work done otherwise.

There was one thing she hadn't told her mother, and that was how being friends with Severus was making it hard to form friends in Gryffindor house. Not that she cared. She was friends with Severus before school, and she planned to be his friend for a long time afterwards. Even his less than cheerful disposition at school wasn't going to stop her. Or his friends, who she could admit hated her more than her friends hated Severus. "Tuney shouldn't be there today. She went over to Gloria's house for the afternoon."

"You want me to meet your mother?"

Lily bit her lip and nodded. Severus sounded so lost by the very idea, and she had no idea why. She knew his parents bickered, and that he lived in conditions that weren't good, but that didn't mean she wasn't allowed to invite him over.

"Well, yeah. That's not a problem is it?"

"N-no," Severus stammered, his sallow cheeks turning a funny shade of pink that Lily found amusing. She'd never seen a boy blush like that and she grasped his hand and squeezed it tight.

"Come on, they'll still be warm if we hurry," she urged, pulling him across the sand towards the road.

Sweaty palms clasped together, they raced side by side down the crumbling street, sharing fleeting smiles as they stumbled over rocks and jumped over cracks in the pavement. Lily laughed as they made a sharp turn, swinging into her driveway, and up the front steps.

They burst through the door, panting and giggling, and collapsed on the stairs.

"Mum!" Lily called, between giggles. Beside her Severus was trying to flatten his hair. She pulled out her hair tie and gestured with her finger for him to turn around so she could get at his hair. He protested the need for the tie, but eventually gave in when he heard a cabinet door shut down the hall. Lily grinned and grabbed at his hair, raking her fingers through the slick black locks and pulling it all into a low pony tail at the base of his neck.

"Ha!" she declared, kissing the back of his head. "Perfect!"

Severus mumbled something, and two spots of colour reappeared on his cheeks making him look sunburned. "Thank you," he said gruffly.

"Lily, is that you?"

Severus pulled at the small ponytail, looking at her uncertainly. She wanted to reassure him that he looked fine.

"I'm in the hall, mum!" Lily called back, slinging an arm along Severus' shoulders. She pecked his forehead like her mother sometimes did to her when she was scared. It didn't seem to help a lot. Actually it just made Severus tenser.

"Is Severus with you, love?"

"Yeah, he's here!" She smiled at him and had to stop herself from giggling at his scowl. He looked like he was going to be sick. "You ready?"

"No, but I suppose I should prepare myself, yes?"

Lily shook her head and pulled Severus to his feet. "It's just biscuits with my mum. It's not like you're having tea with the Prime Minister."

"But it's your mother. It's only polite—"

"Come on, Sev," Lily laughed, taking his hand once again. She dragged him a couple of feet forward. It felt like every step he took was a silent form of resistance to the inevitable. His eyes were darting around the hall as if expecting the people in the old family portraits to come to life and strangle him. "Come on," she urged, letting go of his hand so she could run ahead into the kitchen.

Lily barreled into her mother's side and beamed up at her. A brilliant smile answered her as her mother bent over and kissed the top of her head, before wrapping an arm around her shoulder. She groaned in embarrassment. There had been a time when she would have welcomed this type of attention with a happy smile, now she buried her face against her mother's side, her cheeks turning bright pink.

"Where's your friend?"

"He's being shy, which is stupid," Lily informed her with an annoyed huff. "Why should he be? It's just you. He's acting like he's meeting the queen!"

Her mother smiled and untangled herself from Lily's clutches. "Best bring him in then before he gets so flustered he can't finish making it down the hall."

"Mum!" Lily cried. "That's horrible!"

She winked and went over to the oven, opening the door a little way to peer inside. Lily shook her head and went back into the hall to find Severus standing where she had left him. He really was looking peaky. Even after spending a year away at Hogwarts with him, she had never seen him get this worked up over something. Not even when Potter and Black were picking on him. At least then he'd got angry. She had to admit she didn't like that aspect of him, but she could overlook it. This was the real Severus and she felt pained by how scared he was.

"Come on then. If you don't want to I can grab the cookies and we can eat them outside," she offered, caressing his jacket-covered arm. "You just have to say so."

"You don't want me to meet your mother?" Severus asked, clearly confused. His eyebrows knitted together in thought and she pushed her thumb against his forehead, trying to straighten the wrinkle forming.

She giggled for a few seconds before sobering at his hurt expression. "Sev, I wouldn't have brought you here with me if I didn't. Do you think I like seeing you like this?"

"I—no, you're too nice for that."

"Too right," she chirped. The confusion gradually eased from his face and he gave her a hesitant smile.

"You really want—"

"Let's go," Lily said. This time she was determined to get him at least to the doorway of the kitchen if not into it. "They smelled like chocolate."

Lily pretended she didn't see him perk up at that announcement. But the arm under her hand seemed looser and she slipped her hand into his clammy one. She led him down the narrow hallway, having to stop when he spotted a picture of her entering primary school. Lily bit her lip. She knew she hadn't been the prettiest little girl in the world, and her eyes looked too big for her head.

"That is you?"

"Yeah, my mum and dad made both me and Tuney take a picture before school started. It's hideous, I know,"

"I thought you looked cute," Severus whispered, releasing her hand and ducking around her. He entered the kitchen without her and Lily gaped at his retreating back. Blushing like mad, she followed him in, hovering in the entryway.

"So, this must be Severus Snape."

Lily moved to stand beside him and grasped his shaking hand. She offered him a blinding smile which didn't seem to ease his nerves but made them even worse.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Evans," Severus said politely with a shy smile.

"The pleasure's all mine, Mr. Snape," Lily's mother returned with an arched brow. Lily realized she'd never told her mum about the careful way Severus chose his words. Then again, she'd never done anything that had surprised her mother before and she reveled in the expression. "The biscuits are almost done. Pull out a chair and sit down."

Severus pulled a chair out from the table and gestured for Lily to sit on it. He pushed her in without even blushing, as if it was expected of him and not out of the ordinary. He took his own place at the table beside Lily before saying, "Thank you for inviting me over, Mrs Evans. "

Lily's mother smiled and plucked a spatula out of a drawer full of utensils. "I've been hoping to meet you. Lily talks about nothing else."

Severus flushed and stared down at the table top. Lily saved him from answering. "Mum, remember that great cleaning charm I told you about at Christmas?"

"Of course, you were excited to test it out on Alice's bed if I remember correctly."

"Yeah, well, Severus knew it and taught me how!"

"Did you really?" her mother asked, directing the question at Severus. The spatula stopped right above the biscuit tin. The obvious pleasure and gratitude in Lily's mother's tone seemed to be having the reverse effect on Severus as opposed to what it normally did. Normally, people would open up to her mother after a few minutes of talking to her, but Severus appeared so flustered that any words were getting stuck to the roof of his mouth. "She's been dying for a way to organize her room at school since no one else was going to help her clean."

"Mum," Lily whined, embarrassed for herself and her tongue-tied friend.

"Thank you," Severus whispered, blushing. Lily watched him in worry as his face turned pale when the biscuits were set in front of him. Severus shot her a wide-eyed look, and she frowned. He mumbled a hurried excuse and rushed from the room, down the hall, and Lily heard the bathroom door slam open.

Her mother rested a hand on her shoulder that Lily shrugged off. Worrying wasn't doing anything. "I'm going to go and see if he's all right," she said, before disappearing from the kitchen as well.

The sound of retching could be heard down the short hall and Lily winced. Nothing ever was easy with Severus, was it? She sighed and rolled up her sleeves before entering the bathroom, trying hard not to breathe. Severus was hanging over the toilet bowl, fingers clutching the sides tightly. His lank hair had fallen out of its tie and was hanging around his jaw. Lily gathered it back in silence, holding it off his face. He groaned, shoulders slumping forward in misery.

"S'sorry," he slurred, glancing at her out of the corner of his eyes, before lurching forward again. Lily looked away unsure of what else to do. Her mum used to rub her back when she threw up, and hesitantly, she began to do the same to Severus. He tensed and Lily paused mid-motion. Was she doing it wrong? "Your mother hates me, doesn't she?"

"Don't be silly, Severus. My mum doesn't hate you."

"But--"

Lily shook her head and embraced him lightly. "Are you all right?"  
Severus groaned, looking at her in disbelief.

"Right, dumb question."

Lily pulled back, wiping a strand of hair off his face that clung there from sweat. He watched her movements around the room through tired eyes as she filled a cup from the side of the sink with cold water. He took the glass from her with shaking fingers and a weary stare. Lily hovered in the door, eyeing him in concern.

"Lily? Is Severus all-- oh dear."

Severus blanched, cheeks suffused with a light pink as he gazed down into the cup in his hands.

He didn't even notice when Lily's mother entered the bathroom fully, but he did notice when she took the glass from his lax fingers before he could drop it. She captured his hands and attention before speaking, "It usually takes Lily about a dozen biscuits before she's sick. Perhaps it's a particularly nasty batch. They get you before you even take a bite."

Lily giggled into her hands and shot Severus a teasing grin while her mother smirked. "Now, let's get you cleaned up, and out into the fresh air."

Severus looked like he didn't know what to do with himself when Lily's mother hauled him to his feet, keeping her arm around his shoulder as she brought him to their sink. She let him splash water on his face for a few moments and give him a chance to recompose before letting her arm fall.

"Lily, take him out the front, and I'll bring the biscuits out there instead. Why waste such a gorgeous day sitting inside?"

"Yes, mum!" Lily chirped, grabbing Severus' hand once again.

"And Severus?"

Severus froze mid-escape and turned. "Mrs Evans?"

"I'd love to have tea with you sometime next week, if that's all right with you?"

Severus gaped, mouth hanging open unattractively. "Y-yes, Mrs Evans," he stammered, before disappearing around the corner.

"You really shouldn't be so surprised, Sev," Lily commented as they left the house. "You are my best friend and that's never going to change."


End file.
